Hiring, managing, and retaining your fixed operations hourly staff can be time-consuming and a drain on your managers. Outsourcing this labor could be a game-changer to free up your resources to spend more time on sales and service. There are many types of vendors out there offering this service, including valet and detail companies. Below are six main considerations you should make before selecting a partner.

1. Insurance

Local valet parking companies seem like a reasonable option, but the truth is they are not insured properly for the activities required of an automotive retail location. There’s a 100% chance that their insurance coverage does not afford the ability to move vehicles off-site and over the road. To leverage the best labor model, it is a requirement to provide on-road driving capacity and the appropriate risk management.

2. Scale

Detail and valet parking services may perform well at one location, but what happens when you try to replicate those results? Typically, this is where small operators struggle to create consistent guest experiences. Building deep management teams and a reporting structure that focuses on service, safety, and budget takes years and years to perfect. A partner with the resources to scale allows the top automotive retailers to win big with a full-scope managed service provider.

3. Scope

A valet parking company may be versed in greeting customers and parking cars, but that’s about where it ends. A true automotive partner should be able to provide it all; leveraging on-site management to accomplish more at an overall lower expense. Adding pickup and delivery and parts logistics is where a true partner can solve for more with less.

4. Recruitment

Many providers are typically flat organizations without the robust recruitment teams required to keep candidates flowing. Look for a vendor that has invested significantly in software and recruitment marketing strategies that continuously fill roles and battle turnover.

5. Focus

Asking a detail company or valet parking service to provide additional services often dilutes already lean management teams. Companies built to service the restaurant, hotel, or condominium segment are working 24 hours a day on someone else’s problem. Without dedicated automotive-focused management, results will be hard to obtain.

6. Expertise

Only automotive-managed service providers will understand how to impact your business immediately. Look for a vendor with experience across brands and markets that can provide great insight into service processes that work. A valet or detail provider will not know how to deliver results that translate into higher CSI/CSE scores, technician efficiency, and service advisor success.

DealerFLEX has exclusively served retail automotive dealerships for over ten years. Our mission is to empower retail automotive operations to focus on driving sales and service success by providing the very best people and technology. We tackle tough-to-manage roles and risk with a permanent managed labor solution where safety is our top priority.

If you want to learn more about how we can help, schedule time with our CEO and automotive hospitality expert for a custom labor solution.